And They Say War Is Hell
by WritingAmateur
Summary: "X-Men: First Class" meets the Vin Diesel film "The Pacifier." After botching a mission and failing to protect scientist Hank McCoy, agent Erik Lehnsehrr now faces the toughest assignment of his life: protect his five unruly mutant children. Add a telepathic high school principal, a cruel human wrestling coach, and a remixed classic musical, and it's going to get messy.
1. In Which Erik is Not Being Punished

**United States Military Base. Location: Classified. 03 April, 0900 Hours**

Erik's jaw drops before he can stop it, blue-gray eyes going wide with what he knows can only register as unmitigated _panic._

"Commander—sir. You—can't _possibly_ be asking this of me—"

He fights to keep his posture, his composure, though it seems every muscle in his body has tensed up in response to Shaw's directive. His accent, hard-edged yet lilting, coming through heavier than usual, his first language spilling into his thoughts, rendering it all an echo chamber of annoyance. _Fuck_ _protocol_ , _fuck the code_ — _ich kann nicht es glauben—das ist total Quatsch, mein Gott—_

Shaw cocks his head to the side, brow furrowed in concern, though his eyes betray a not-unkind twinkle of _schadenfreude_.

"Erik. Please. You're the best hope they've— _we've_ —got. The people who kidnapped Dr. McCoy—they won't stop at that, and we _really_ can't afford to give the humans something to worry about if news of the Virus leaks out."

 _We're already up to our asses doing damage control_ , he doesn't need to say.

 _And it's on your shoulders,_ is what Erik ascertains from the way his commander's words hang in the air, heavy with meaning.

Erik sighs, lifts a trembling hand and pinches the bridge of his nose hard, squeezing his eyes shut as if upon opening them all of this—this ridiculous conversation, this _absurd_ order from his commander—will have merely been a bad dream, a nightmare leaving the taste of ash in his mouth. As if this whole situation in which he's found himself—the botched mission, the doctor's death—not to mention the collateral damage and expense wasted on this effort, nothing but bad press, another set of anti-mutant think-pieces no doubt gearing themselves up in the papers, on the news channels, those smug human bastards undoubtedly feigning concern and gloating inwardly about the failures of mutants to conduct themselves safely and properly, to prove they aren't the threat they so clearly _are—_

A groan ekes itself through unwilling lips from somewhere in his chest. He jumps at the sensation of touch. A fatherly hand patting him on the shoulder—considerate but firm. Unwavering.

"Erik. _Lieutenant._ " The low voice indicating the non-negotiability of the order. The quiet tone demanding obedience.

"You're punishing me, Commander." Erik's voice surly and petulant as he slips comfortably back into the role of prodigal, unruly son, feeling like half his age in front of Shaw, like he always has, always does—

"I'm not."

Erik peels apart his eyelids with trepidation. "Sir?"

Shaw is grinning now, though the upper half of his face doesn't register it, forehead and brow line smooth and slick and un-furrowed—an unmistakable sign of vanity. His mutation. Something about it being better than Botox, evidently.

Erik idly wonders how old Commander Shaw _actually_ is, because he's certainly _not_ in his late thirties—

"Besides, they're cute in person. All sweethearts, even the teenagers. You'll do just fine."

 **Location: Classified. 02 April, 0000 Hours**

 _"All right, officers—listen up. Commander Shaw's orders. This is going to be an extraction—simple, bloodless, painless, as long as you follow instructions_."

 _The metal of the plane thrums around him, making him almost giddy despite the weight of the parachute on his back, the thudding noise his boots make, as he paces before his squad. Palms and the backs of his knees practically crackling with feeling as he stands in the center of this magnificent metal beast, even though his hands are encased in thick leather, his weather-beaten uniform separating his skin from the structure of the vehicle._

 _The officers—the cream of the crop that is the United States Mutant Special Forces Team—stand in a line before him, their eyes trained and focused. Waiting._

 _"Our intelligence has indicated that Doctor McCoy will be located in the brig of the ship. Fortunately, most of the agents on this ship are humans, so they won't put up much of a fight. However, it'll be a damned public relations disaster for the program if any of them_ die _, of course—"_

 _One of the officers curses under his breath, which makes the side of Erik's stern mouth quirk up, quick as a blink._

 _"—and, of course, since there's not really enough metal on that ship for me to take care of things_ myself _, those damned bastards…" Erik pauses, cutting off his train of thought, and stops his pacing, coming to stand before a young officer—the one who had muttered something unkind about humans only moments ago. The young man with the stoic, freckled face and slightly upturned nose, and the power to create—and manipulate—ice._

 _He refuses to call the officer "Iceman," no matter what the rest of the lot call him._

 _"Drake—you'll be first on the ground, and you're going to incapacitate everyone on that ship you can find. Nothing lethal, of course—just make sure it'll take a few hours to melt them out."_

 _Drake nods dutifully, mouth set in a thin line. Erik returns the nod and takes a step to the left, where he has to look down at the next officer to make eye contact—a young girl, younger than Erik would like to think about with regards to the danger of this job—a girl with prominent cheekbones and a gap between her front teeth._

 _"You, Rogue—you'll drop in next, and do another sweep of the people Drake's neutralized. Make sure none of them are hiding any surprises." He looks meaningfully at Rogue's hands, which, unlike Erik's and the rest of the team, are bare, the nails bitten to the quick, but steady by her side nonetheless. "Of course, Drake will be radioing back to us if he encounters any difficulties—that is, if any of the people on the ship happen to be one of_ us _. In that case, you'll need to be completely ready to assist him."_

 _Rogue nods in understanding, chin wobbling slightly, and Erik kindly pretends he doesn't see Drake's gloved hand brush reassuringly against Rogue's naked one._

 _Erik then turns sharply to face the officer on Rogue's right, another a pretty, pale young girl with large eyes, eyes with gray-blue daubs beneath them, to be sure, after all, none of them have really slept in the last week or so—eyes that nonetheless betray no fear._

 _"Pryde—you're going to do a sweep of the entire ship and locate Doctor McCoy. You'll then radio back with his location, at which point I'll drop in and recover the good doctor. By this time Pryde_ , _with any luck, will have commandeered the vessel, and we'll then make our way to the_ rendezvous _point. Do you copy?"_

 _Erik would be lying if the way his officers respond instantly with "sir, yes, sir!" doesn't warm the cockles of his heart._

 _Of course, the mission doesn't exactly go as planned._

 _It starts off exactly as it should, with Drake sufficiently freezing every crew member he comes across—all human, it seems. Rogue, seemingly relieved to not have to use her power, strange and cruel as it is to her, is close by his side, just in case. Pryde follows, blurring through the walls of the wooden craft until she locates McCoy—still conscious, gagged, tied up with rope—and alerts Erik, who lands, sheds his heavy gear, and makes his stealthy way to the brig._

 _The good doctor's ashen face lights up when he sees Erik; as Erik sets about slicing through the rope and removing the rag in his mouth, he spits out, eyes wide with tears—"Oh, thank goodness, I thought I'd never see my family again—my wife would've killed me if I hadn't gotten out, ha, ha—"_

 _It is, of course, when Pryde's begun to change course, the boat slicing through choppy blue-green waters, that a plastic bullet—seemingly appearing out of nowhere—grazes Erik's ear and strikes the soft flesh of Doctor Hank McCoy's neck, killing him instantly._

 _Erik's eyes widen in horror as McCoy crumples to the ground, whipping around to find himself face to face with a familiar young man with waxy skin and greasy dark hair._

 _"A—Allerdyce—" he manages to sputter out, using his gift to desperately feel around for a scrap of metal, anything he can use, because he sure as hell hadn't seen_ this _coming—_

 _"Pity Iceman's little freezer burn trick is useless against me, hmm?" the man says, smirking, withdrawing a single wooden watch from his sweatshirt pocket. Before Erik can crush the damned thing into a pulp, a searing heat wave crackles in his vision, a blinding light raising the hairs on his arm; he raises his hand in front of his face in a last-ditch effort at self-preservation, mind given over entirely to thoughts of_ Scheiße, diese Hurensohn—

 _Then suddenly the burning sensation is gone, and then Erik knows that Drake is by his side, somehow, his gloves removed, bare hand perfectly chilled as he rests it on Erik's forehead. Erik cracks his eyes open to find Allerdyce lying on the ground, unmoving, with the impossibly small figure of Rogue standing above him, looking white as a sheet, hands held out in front of her as if to keep Allerdyce's power as far from herself as possible._

 **United States Military Base. Location: Classified. 03 April, 0845 Hours**

Erik fidgets in the plastic chair across the desk from his commander, a good-looking man endlessly skilled at schmoozing and getting his way, who was thusly promoted to his rank in an unprecedentedly short amount of time, and stares at his hands in his lap, where a pile of loose change has become, over the past few seconds, the following: an indeterminate blob, a miniature Model-T car, a tiny Koons-esque balloon animal of some sort, and a set of tweezers fit for a porcelain doll.

"It's my fault." His voice is flat as the metal in his hands separates into a clump of dimes once more, which he closes his fists around, looking up sharply to meet Commander Shaw's eyes.

"Now, Lieutenant— _Erik_ —it's not your fault—we had no way of knowing that Allerdyce would be involved in this whole mess. Unfortunately, Drake couldn't really do much—it seems that Allerdyce was smart about it, played dumb while your team did their jobs, and then—"

 _Then Hank McCoy got a bullet in his neck._

 _—a plastic one._

"It's like they knew I was coming—there wasn't any damned metal on that ship," Erik grouses, as Shaw lets out a rueful sigh.

"Among our kind, Erik, you're not _exactly_ a well-kept secret." Shaw leans over behind his desk and withdraws a thick manila folder, which he then slides across his desk to Erik.

"McCoy was one of our own, as well," Shaw begins quietly as Erik flips open the folder, digging his teeth into his lower lip, and begins to skim through the pages contained within. A photo of the man with a motley bunch of people—his family, Erik presumes—stacked on top of lab reports, newspaper clippings…

"He was working on controlling—and creating a cure for—the Legacy Virus."

Erik feels an ice-cold drop of sweat slither along his spine. Hands growing clammy, a lump forming in his throat as he looks up from the file to meet Shaw's eyes.

 _The Legacy Virus—_ Scheiße _._

"I thought the Legacy Virus was—was a _myth_ ," Erik manages to whisper at last, voice more hoarse than he'd like it to be. He licks his lips uselessly as Shaw shakes his head, his mouth twisted into a frown.

 _The Legacy Virus—exactly the thing that could wreck this farce of a truce between mutants and humanity—as tenuous as it is, if the humans learned that it was_ real— _this thing that could kill them all with one fell swoop—_

"Apparently the myth became reality." Shaw rests his elbows on his desk and folded his hands beneath his chin, looking at Erik, a grave expression slipping onto his face. "Doctor McCoy somehow acquired a sample of it, _somewhere_ , _somehow_ , maybe he developed a few milliliters for testing, for _God knows_ what reason—scientific curiosity, I should _hope_ —and was—well. Playing around with it. Getting to understand how exactly it worked."

"Did he succeed?" Erik wipes his sweaty hands on his khakis, briefly considering sitting on them to hide their incessant trembling before thinking better of it and closing the folder on his lap, lacing his fingers together on top of the thick beige card stock.

"Whoever kidnapped him seems to think so. Of course, we can't exactly _ask_ him anymore…"

Erik looks down at his hands once more, feeling his shoulder blades move over knots upon knots of muscle in his upper back.

Shaw clears his throat, clearly sensing the futility of twisting the knife of Erik's failure further. "Luckily, Doctor McCoy was careful about documentation. And, even more luckily for us, he was _very_ careful about _storing_ his research. Our intelligence indicates that he kept his files in a safety-deposit box in a Swiss bank."

Erik flickers his eyes upward, thoughts collecting and stumbling from between tight lips. "So you need me to get into the bank?—it shouldn't be a problem, Commander Shaw—really, Commander, even if they've upgraded from steel to some kind of chemical whatever—I _can_ do this, I _will_ —"

 _Anything. Anything to make up for this mess. Really—_ Gott _, anything, anything I can do—_

Shaw shakes his head briefly. "I thank you for your eagerness to help, Erik, but we've got an easier way of doing this—a more _legal_ , palatable way." He briefly rises from his seat, reaches across his desk, and plucks the file folder from Erik's lap with sure, elegant hands.

"This," Shaw says, handing Erik a slick piece of paper, "is his family."

Erik squints down at the black-and-white portrait, where Doctor McCoy and a pleasant-looking woman are sitting on a bench in some tree-lined setting. The woman holds a small bundle in one arm, with a small boy with unruly curls perched on her opposite knee. On Doctor McCoy's lap sits a little girl, her face pressed into a pout, while standing behind the bench are two teenagers, a boy in a hoodie and a girl who looks as though she'd rather be anywhere but there.

"Are they…" Erik begins, holding the photo closer to his face to try and make out more details.

"…Mutants?" Shaw finishes helpfully. He nods firmly. "Well, the kids are. They're adopted—the wife—the _widow_ —is human, but the kids are our kind, just like McCoy was."

 _Hank McCoy and his wife took in abandoned mutant children._ Erik feels a strange, unwanted prickle behind his eyes at the thought of those five children, who at one point must have been so _alone_ , so _afraid_ , so consumed with self-loathing as Erik had been all those years ago—

—what in the world _wouldn't_ Erik have given, back then, to be raised with that kind of _love_ —

"Luckily, Moira—that's McCoy's widow—as the doctor's former spouse, has the authority to go to Switzerland and retrieve the contents of the safety-deposit box. We can't know what we're dealing with—what we're up against with the good doctor's research, and, of course, this issue is now priority one for our division. I'll be accompanying her to Switzerland to make sure nothing falls into the wrong hands." Shaw presses his lips together, his voice dropping to a cautious whisper. " _Imagine_ , Erik—if whoever is responsible for kidnapping McCoy got their hands on his research—everything we've worked for all these years, the trust we've been given, the concessions both sides have made to make this _work_ —our _coexistence_ —"

As much as Erik loathes humans on both a personal and ideological level—can barely swallow his disgust for them the vast majority of his waking hours—he agrees. _We can't afford to have this virus out there._ He places the photograph back onto Shaw's desk and sits back in his seat, drumming his fingers on his knee idly as Shaw tucks the photograph of the McCoy family back into the manila folder and places it crisply on his desk.

Erik clears his throat. "Commander, if that's all there is to your plan, may I take my leave?"

Shaw sits back in his seat, a tiny grin curving on his lips as he crosses his legs. "I never said that was all there was to this operation, Lieutenant."

 _I don't understand—what could the Commander—_

Erik narrows his eyes reflexively, mind beginning to whir with the grace and efficiency of a well-oiled machine. Fitting cogs into their places, the circular studded wheels of logic ticking away, tumblers into locks, all moving slowly, then more quickly, sparks beginning to fly as understanding dawns on him.

 _Scheiße._

 **Location: Oak Park, Illinois. April 14, 1000 Hours**

 _8210 Summers Lane…_

Erik studies the print-out in his hand one final time, already feeling a damned headache coming on as he looks back up, squints for the house number, wherever it is on this ridiculously unsafe fire-hazard clapboard monstrosity of a two-story house. The once perfectly-manicured lawn overgrown in places with dandelions and weeds, a little red wagon lying on its side a bright shout against the artificially bright greenery.

 _Well, there's_ definitely _a child living here_ , Erik muses to himself caustically, mouth filling with a bitter taste for what seems like the eighteenth time since Commander Shaw had given him his orders.

Of course, Shaw could dress it up and sugarcoat it however he damned well pleased—dropping little notes of flattery here and there about how only his _most valuable, most skilled_ officer Erik Lehnsherr could have passed muster for a job this _crucial_ —how _vital_ this assignment was for the division, the country, even the _world_ , and how it really couldn't possibly be _that_ hard; _it's only for a few days, Erik,_ in a sing-song voice that _really_ did nothing to make Erik feel less like he'd been put in some kind of time-out chair, as it were…

—It still wouldn't change the fact that Lieutenant Erik Lehnsherr, leader of the _verdammt_ United States Mutant Special Forces Team, was being ordered to _babysit_.

 _"You_ really _don't think this is—well—a waste of my skill set, Commander Shaw?"_

Erik feels remarkably like a martyr as he picks up his single black suitcase, packed with three identical black turtlenecks, chosen for their utility as well as for comfort, three pairs of khaki pants, errantly fiddling with the zipper on his brown leather jacket without really thinking about it.

 _Shaw had looked at him, face gone completely serious._

 _"I have no doubt that you are the man for this task, Lieutenant."_

Erik grits his teeth together as he makes his way up the red-brick pathway leading to the house's front door. Ticking off the information he'd been given in the dossier on the McCoy family—five kids, ranging from eighteen to fourteen months, keeping it all organized at the front of his brain. The oldest one, Angel, apparently flies, thanks to some iridescent sort of dragonfly wings she's got growing out of her back. The next one, Alex, sixteen, shoots some kind of blasty-firey energy out of his body— _gee, won't_ that _be fun to manage_. The middle one, Raven, is a shapeshifter. The toddler, Sean, does something-or-other with sound waves, while the infant, Armando, seems to be incapable of getting injured—in a house with five children, one would think a baby would be the first to suffer in a chaotic moment, but so far, the dossier had noted, Armando had been able to survive burns, being left alone in the tub for too long, being dropped from a foot's height, being dropped from _ten feet_ 's height, and being left alone in a stuffy parked car for over an hour.

The dossier had also emphasized, with several underlines beneath the text, that none of the McCoy children have managed to control their powers.

 _Yay._

As he lifts his hand to knock on the door, Shaw's final comment floats back into his mind, unbidden:

 _"And remember, Erik—please smile. Trust me. Kids like that kind of thing better."_

Rolling his eyes, Erik tugs his mouth into something showing teeth.

 _Well, let's get this damned job over with._

Erik has barely brushed his knuckles against the deep, rich brown wood of the front door before it flies open, revealing a small girl who comes just up to Erik's waist, a rosy-cheeked thing with long yellow hair who looks him up and down, staring briefly at his strange leering expression. With a noise like pages being flipped in a book, the girl begins to grow, to shift form, tiny blue feather-scales engulfing her body as Erik comes face to face with his doppelgänger, right down to the scuffs on the toes of his brown boots.

Erik's eyes widen at this sudden display, utterly taken aback— _this must be Raven_ , _the shapeshifter,_ he thinks wildly, stupidly, gripping his suitcase handle just a _little_ more tightly as the Raven-Erik thing opens its mouth and screams _bloody murder_ , the voice coming from his twin's lips that of a young girl's—high pitched, keening, digging right into his temples.

From deeper within the house, Erik hears a woman's voice, sounding ragged and pleading: "No—Raven, honey, _please_ don't start screaming—you'll only set off Sean—" followed by several sets of footsteps on wood floors, growing louder and louder as Raven's scream is echoed by someone else, only louder and more pure, somehow, followed by what can only be the sound of glass breaking—

Raven-Erik looks over its shoulder and quickly reverts back to the blonde girl in her pink nightgown, looking innocent as can be; Erik follows her gaze to see what looks and sounds like a damned _adult_ in this madhouse, _finally_ , a harried-looking woman with brownish hair and doe eyes carrying a small baby in her arms, a ginger toddler at her heels, who pauses behind Raven in the doorway, breathing heavily for a moment, as she considers the man standing on her doorstep.

Erik's cheeks are becoming numb from holding the smile for so damned long. "Ah—I'm Erik Lehnsherr," he says abruptly, hoping to establish some damned clarity, holding out his free hand before realizing that the woman's arms are full of drooling infant.

"Oh—oh _thank god_ you're here, Mr. Lehnsherr—I'm Moira, Moira McCoy—I'm Hank's widow," the woman sputters out, relief etching itself into the lines of her forehead, her exhaustion plain as day, all hollow cheeks and quick, nervous smile as she looks down at Raven, who has since turned her attention back to Erik. "I'm almost packed and ready to leave to meet Commander Shaw—thank you _so, so much_ for doing this, Mr. Lehnsherr—really, I-I can't thank you enough—"

The screaming starts up again as the red-headed small child turns and runs back into the depths of the house, accompanied by loud popping and tinkling noises; Moira closes her eyes for a moment, clearly debating the merits of scolding and/or shushing a child whose voice can clearly turn glass into dangerous little points of light and broken edges, scattered all over the floor—

"Please, please come in, my gosh, I'm so sorry to keep you waiting on the stoop like this, where are my manners—" Moira opens her eyes sharply, quickly pulling Raven away from the doorway as Erik steps tentatively across the threshold, resisting the urge to look backwards, back to the street outside, back to _freedom_ and _not these children_ as he pulls the door shut behind him.

The foyer of the McCoy household is not particularly notable or unique—mid-century, warm cream-colored walls and nondescript floor rugs. A staircase a few yards ahead of him leads up to a second floor, and as Erik's gaze trails upwards he catches a glimpse of what can only be a lightbulb-less chandelier, the oxidized metal buds curling around nothing.

Moira follows Erik's sightline and smiles apologetically. "Sean—my second youngest—he's still, um, working on controlling his voice. There—there _used_ to be lightbulbs and everything in it, I swear, but with Hank gone, it's become a _little_ —"

She presses her lips together as if she's said too much; Erik has rarely seen someone looks quite so _lost_ as Moira looks right now. He meets her gaze and nods quickly, allowing his facial muscles to _relax_ , _mein Gott_ , as a strange sort of awkwardness begins to bubble in his stomach. He looks down at his boots and shuffles them a bit uselessly on the carpet, as if to remove any errant mud from the heels.

Moira takes a short, shallow breath, and ushers Erik out of the hallway and into a frankly _destroyed-looking_ sitting room, where the paintings and pictures all seem to hang at the same crooked angle, the walls below them covered with trailing lines of crayon, broken toys littering the floor; as Erik nearly trips over some vapid-looking Barbie doll, fighting the urge to swear loudly and in several languages, Moira gingerly sets herself down onto a once-presentable, now stained-couch. Erik coils himself into a too-small rocking chair across from her, feeling Raven's eyes crawling along his skin like an army of insects from where the tiny girl has seated herself on the couch next to her mother.

Armando, the indestructible infant, wriggles giddily— _is that it?_ Erik wonders sardonically— _are babies even capable of emotion beyond "feed me" and "I've just shit myself"?—_ in Moira's arms as she leans over, presses her lips to Raven's round cheek.

"Honey, this is—" she looks Erik up and down, clearly weighing how best to broach the fact of just _who_ Erik is—"this is Mr. Lehnsherr. He's from the military—the mutant division, and he's going to be helping out around the house while I'm gone."

 _Technically, it's_ Lieutenant _Lehnsherr_ , he wants to quip under his breath, then bites his tongue as he stretches the lower half of his face into something that is _definitely_ not a grimace.

Raven considers the implications of her mother's statement, brow furrowing in concentration; another scream, clear as a bell, breaks through the moment of quiet, growing ever louder, Erik screwing his eyes shut and willing himself not to fly into a frustrated _rage_ as Sean, the mop of red hair attached to a skinny, sunburnt body, rushes into the room like a ginger tornado and flings himself onto his mother's lap on the couch, only stopping the keening from the back of his throat when he makes accidental eye contact with Erik, looking for all the world like a constipated shark with all of his teeth showing, and quickly falls silent, hands flying upwards to cover his mouth.

Erik considers this something like a small victory that he's managed to make the damned child shut up, and for a moment the smile is somewhat genuine.

Heavy footsteps sound on the steps, the squeak of what sounds like too-new combat boots on hardwood floor just as unpleasant as Sean's incessant glass-breaking squealing, break the silent truce Erik seems to have established; Sean lifts his hands from his mouth and starts screaming again as a boy and a girl enter the sitting room— _Alex and Angel_ , Erik thinks frantically, the boy's shiny Doc Martens sliding on the floor combining with Sean's screams to drill what feels like a very deep hole into the center of his forehead.

Of course, this is the precise moment when a car's obnoxious _honk_ decides to cap everything off, adding the apparently-needed cherry to this ice-cream sundae of cacophony. Moira's eyes widen, her face slipping out of worry into downright _alarm—_ "that's my taxi to the airport—oh, _goodness_ —" With a series of jerky motions she peels herself from the couch, handing Armando off to the oldest girl, Angel, who accepts the baby without a change in expression, her mouth flat and eyes narrowed in suspicion as she regards Erik, this strange intruder going and wrecking what fragile peace her family had cobbled together this morning; Alex, looking like he's smelled sour milk, pushes his hood down around his shoulders and clomps on over to the couch, where he slides in between Raven and Sean, who, Erik _really_ must admit, has _quite_ the vocal stamina—

Moira reappears, face flushed, two duffel bags pulling down her shoulders in equal measure. "All right, kids—I love you, _I love you_ , please be good for me, okay?"

The five McCoy children immediately gather around their mother, each fighting for a piece of her to hold on to, anything, because _this_ Erik recognizes, this primal fear electrifying the McCoy children's limbs, even the baby's—the fear, unspeakable except for a silent scream, that they might never see her again.

 _That she won't come back… just like their father_. Erik swallows down a lump in his throat as Moira presses kisses onto each child's head, even the oldest two, and then, with another breathless rush of " _thankyous_ " directed at Erik, wedges the door open and shuts it behind her.

The house is silent, save for the trace sounds of the taxicab pulling away from the curb.

Erik lets out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding as he surveys the five children under his care, however loosely that word can be defined— _they'll survive until their mother gets back, dammit._ They each look at him, eyes displaying varying degrees of wariness and reproachfulness.

He surprises himself by clearing his throat, rising from his seat and standing straight at attention. "All right, children," he begins slowly, unsure of how to address these miniature people, because they sure as _hell_ aren't the officers and soldiers he's used to commanding, "I'm going to be in charge of you all while your mother is away. Now, as long as you all follow my instructions and do _precisely_ as I say, we won't have any—"

Sean's resurgent screams cut him off as the child, _wretched thing_ , begins to run around the sitting room, each wail punctuated with a giggle as one, two, three lightbulbs in the ceiling pop and rain down shards of translucent glass, just as Alex, who has begun glaring at Erik, rolls his eyes and quips, "nice _accent_ there, mister whoever the hell you are," as Erik fights the urge to snarl in return, "that's _Mister_ _Fucking Lieutenant Lehnsehrr to you, Dummkopf_ ," Raven decides that this is the perfect moment to throw herself onto the worn-out couch, tears streaming down her face, her hiccuping sobs managing a strange, discordant harmony with the noises coming from Sean; meanwhile, Angel merely looks at Erik coolly, proffers Armando, and states flatly, "I'm eighteen years old, and you're _not_ my dad," before turning on her pointy heel and disappearing to wherever eighteen year-old girls disappear off to.

Erik, caught off guard by the sudden addition of infant to his person, silently curses the day he ever _heard_ the name "Hank McCoy," scrambling to find a hand-hold on Armando, Armando, the one damned child in this family who has _not_ managed to piss him off yet, though, of course, _give things time_ —

It is at this moment, amidst Raven's pitiful weeping and Sean's gleeful destruction, a path of violence that has since seemed to spread to the rest of the downstairs area of the McCoy house, that Armando, sweet, docile Armando looks up at Erik, opens his mouth, and spits up on him, the sticky, pungent liquified whiteness splattering all over Erik's jacket, turtleneck, and chin.

 _Verdammte Arschmade—_


	2. In Which Children Are Actually Demons

**Location: Oak Park, Illinois. April 15, 0100 Hours**

Shaw's grinning face looms on the laptop screen, emitting a glowing light that bleeds into the darkness of the McCoy guest bedroom. "How was your first day, Lieutenant?"

Erik once again fights the recurring urge to mold a knife out of the coins in his pants pocket and stab himself in the eye. Repeatedly.

 _As if he doesn't know—Gott in Himmel—_

"Oh, just—just _fine,_ Commander." His cheeks protest at the strain of the too-wide smile he pulls for what must be something like the fortieth time that day; a vein he hadn't ever had to worry about previously decides to throb painfully in the side of his neck.

Shaw looks at him shrewdly, one eyebrow lifting subtly even as his brow line remains unwrinkled.

"Kids giving you any trouble?"

A hint of mirth in his voice as Erik cannot help but let out an aggrieved sigh-groan, a throaty, gurgling, strangled noise more appropriate to a woman giving birth— _to octuplets, on a rollercoaster, upside-down—_ than to a highly trained army officer on what _really_ should have been a simple assignment—

"They're—they're _downright_ _peachy-keen_ , Commander."

The man on the screen _tsks_ scoldingly, almost mockingly. "Erik, Erik, Erik—you _really_ need to work on your poker face. And your _smile_ , my _God—_ it's a wonder those children aren't all crying in their beds by now, or something—you look like you're going to _eat_ them—"

"Don't assume I've ruled out that option," Erik growls, eyes fluttering closed as he lifts a sweaty hand, presses his fingers to a pressure point between his eyebrows as another piercing headache threatens to split his skull in two. The events of the previous day already are making him consider retirement, homicide, or suicide—or any combination thereof—with no clear ending in sight.

At this, Shaw laughs quietly, lifting a glass of something with an olive in it to his lips. "Now, now, Lieutenant. You're supposed to be _protecting_ these kids, not threatening them with bodily harm—"

Erik throws back his head sharply and groans again, shoulders gone tense, muscles tangling beneath the skin, hands curling into fists tight enough that he feels the pinch in his forearms. "Commander, I—I _assure_ you—these children don't _need_ protection—it's the _world_ that needs protection from _them, mein Gott_ —"

 **Location: Oak Park, Illinois. April 14, 1020 Hours**

Erik realizes that the epithet must have slipped through his lips without his knowing it as the room once again falls silent, all five pairs of McCoy children eyes locking onto him with varying degrees of fear, distrust, and amusement. Sean once again lifting speckly hands to cover his mouth, suppressing his banshee-esque cries; Raven turning her soggy face from the couch cushions, eyes filling with a fresh wave of tears; Alex's mouth twisting into a smirk, a twinkle of satisfaction in his eyes as he looks Erik up and down, confident that _something_ 's already gotten under their unorthodox babysitter's skin; Angel's suspicious, sarcastic face peering around the doorway molding, silently passing what must be thousands of judgements upon Erik, none of them positive—

And _of course_ , Armando's tiny face screws up like a bedraggled toy, folding in on itself, lower lip beginning to wobble uncontrollably; Erik, chin still covered in congealing sick, eyes gone to agonized half-shut slits, tries to gently readjust his grip on the baby, _careful, careful, please don't cry, Armando, please, bitte, please—_

An unmistakable noise like slurpy wet clay ekes itself into Erik's hand. The infant's face suddenly relaxing, body growing soft and floppy post-exertion. Erik's nose wrinkles reactively before his mind has had time to register it properly, and when he _does_ realize—

— _Oh, Scheiße—_

Angel's husky laugh cuts through the quiet even as she lifts two long-nailed fingers to pinch her nostrils shut for effect. "I'm _not_ taking care of that."

 _Of course._

 _Literal Scheiße_.

Alex follows his sister's lead, a deep-voiced booming sound working its way up from his chest, cheeks pinking as he lifts his arms defensively—"Yeah—no. Count me out."—and makes his way out of the sitting room, the pair of them clicking and clomping back up the stairs to their miniature lairs, or something.

Raven watches her siblings leave and sits up abruptly, wiping away the last of her tears with fingers tipped with chipped gold nail polish and cracking a broken, brilliant smile that reveals several missing baby teeth. "That's _gross_ , Darwin!" Her shoulders shake almost gleefully as she plants her feet down on the hardwood floor, kicking away the doll that Erik had almost broken his neck on, and running after Angel and Alex, blond hair fanning out behind her. "I call not-it!"

Erik sighs and turns his gaze to Sean, who still has his hands planted firmly on his mouth, and bites his lip briefly before asking, a hint of resignation in his voice:

"I don't suppose _you_ know how to fix this, do you?"

Sean's reddish curls flop around his face and shoulders as he swings his head back and forth.

Erik rolls his eyes, more at himself than at the child. "I thought as much."

As if understanding the situation, Armando looks back up at Erik with his large, dark eyes and _smiles_ , a single white tooth amidst pink gums twinkling like some tiny pearl.

 **Location: Oak Park, Illinois. April 14, 1030 Hours**

In some way or another he manages to stomach it—rushing into the closest bathroom, furiously swiping all of the towels and soaps in their little dishes off the counter, wishing desperately for a pair of rubber gloves the entire time as well as a clothespin for his nose, because what in the _fuck_ are they feeding babies these days, and _really_ , shouldn't _Armando_ , of all mutants, have learned how _not_ to take a shit at inopportune moments—and _oh danke_ , there _is_ a God, because there's a spare nappy in the cupboard under the sink and Armando thankfully _behaves_ himself as Erik wipes, rinses, slides the diaper onto him with minimal struggle. He fights the urge to gag as he disposes of the ruined diaper, but he does indeed manage to pull off the damned operation; much to Erik's exasperation, Sean is waiting for him outside the bathroom when he opens the door, the impish wretch hopping from one foot to the other, and is close at his heels when Erik makes his way upstairs, wondering which of these rooms belongs to the baby.

In a blur of pajamas and carroty hair, Sean abruptly brushes past Erik into a rather large bedroom filled with sunlight, walls painted a soft sky-blue color, and throws himself onto a red-blanketed bed with a plastic guard-rail on one end of it. Erik readjusts the now yawning Armando in his arms and follows Sean inside, the metal legs of what turns out to be a crib tickling the corners of his senses.

 _Let's get you to sleep,_ Erik thinks at the baby, who cannot possibly hear him, of course, and, quickly moving one of his hands to the back of the baby's head, because that _somehow_ seems like the right thing to do, lowers Armando into the crib, where the infant yawns once more, dark eyelids drooping shut, as his breathing begins to even out.

 _There we go._ _Gott sei danke._

Suddenly boneless and _impossibly_ weary, Erik leans against one of the cloyingly cutesy blue walls, his chin dropping to his chest, bone hitting bone with a mild clack; as his knees assume the qualities of pudding, he finds himself sliding down to sit on the thickly carpeted floor, a suppressed cry for help pushing through clenched teeth as nothing but a puff of air.

Erik _really_ could use a stiff drink right about now—something pungent and chemical and _burning, obliterating_ every memory what can _only_ be a nightmare _—_ but, as the thrumming of the steel watch on his wrist reminds him without his needing to look, it is still the middle of the morning, and well-adjusted people do _not_ get pissed drunk at half-past ten.

 _Well, no-one's_ ever _described me as well-adjusted in my life—_

He croaks out a weary laugh under his breath as he looks up once more, taking in his surroundings with a practiced eye, as if scoping out a target. Now that he's focusing on it, he sees that there are actually little painted _clouds_ punctuating the warm blue walls, with a few rainbows thrown in for effect. Large wooden block letters nailed to the wall spell out "SEAN" over the bed where the toddler with the almighty cry is currently lying, doing something-or-other with his toenails, and "ARMANDO" on the wall above the crib where the indestructible baby is currently resting; the carpet is a deep blue color, rich and soft and downright _comforting_ where it's touching his hands, like some kind of pathologically gentle flayed pet.

A tingling crick in his neck causes Erik to look up at the ceiling, where, to his surprise _,_ he sees what looks like a loopy kid's fever-dream of a painting: seven blobby figures with absurdly large smiling faces standing in a line, all holding hands or appendages or something, with yellowish splotches and purple-red curlicues floating around the cluster of faces and bodies.

 _What could it—_

Erik narrows his eyes in concentration as he stands up with one fluid motion, cocking his head to get a more comprehensive view as he stumbles to the center of the room.

Something too close to _horror_ for his liking washes over him as he realizes that it's a family picture. Hank McCoy, Moira, and the rest of them—Angel, Alex, Raven, Sean, even Armando—all smiling and happy, all _together_ , all _alive—_

 _—and it's my fault that it cannot be like that anymore_.

Iron clenches in his belly, low and hot, teeth grinding together, nose beginning to itch warningly as the sudden flare of tension in his hands causes the coins in his pocket to melt.

 _I won't let anything like that happen again._

 **Location: Oak Park, Illinois. April 14, 1400 Hours**

Erik inhales sharply as he yanks the door of the refrigerator open with a tug of his mind, the magnetized surface littered with endless fliers, watercolors, birthday invitations, and the like, the sudden chill raising dewy drops of sweat on his face.

His shirt back has now soaked through with perspiration, and his khaki pants are, to his chagrin, _irretrievably_ wrinkled and splattered with grass and mud stains; after all, if Erik Lehnsehrr wasn't going to patrol the perimeter of the property, cataloguing every single rosebush, unexplained pile of dirt, and crooked backyard fence slat, he couldn't rightly assert that he was doing his job, now, could he? Thus the ruined pants and the small, reddening scratches on his forearms beneath his dark shirt making him wince.

"I suppose I have to feed these brats, after all," he mutters to himself, bending down slightly to take stock of the contents of the fridge—luckily for him, for _all_ of them, Moira had clearly stocked it before she'd gone—each drawer and shelf is crammed with all the sundry necessities and things children these days eat, Erik supposes, although there doesn't appear to be much in the way of _actual_ nutrition—mainly nasty little plastic boxes of sad-looking salami, several cartons of chocolate milk, one or two stacked half-empty boxes of frozen pizza with _pineapple_ , for _crying out loud_ , cans upon cans of what looks like soda; pulling open one of the drawers, Erik finds what appears to be several hundred individually-wrapped hot dogs, and after a good few minutes of looking, cannot find for the life of him anything resembling vegetables. He can't help but shudder at the thought of poisoning himself with all this unnecessary fat, sugar, and cholesterol—he certainly didn't get to be a prime military office in the best shape of his life by stuffing his face with the likes of _this._

Erik floats the door of the refrigerator closed with a snap, shaking his head dismissively, before moving onto the cabinets; _chips, chips, more chips, marshmallows, Twinkies, mein Gott, it's anyone's guess how these children manage to get through the day, stuffed to the gills with this junk…_

A tentative set of footsteps raises the hairs on his forearms beneath his long sleeves. Erik quickly pushes the cupboard door closed before turning to find the source of the sound: it's Raven, Raven who is seemingly content to stay in her princess-pink nightgown all day, Raven who had sized him up in just a few moments and copied him down to the last detail, Raven whose eyes are now wide and shiny with the glitter of unasked questions as she takes him in, this scary stranger in her house, this mean, yelling man with the pointy teeth who is _not_ her father, who is the _reason_ her father isn't going to come home ever again—

Guilt pulls at his chest something awful as Raven asks, almost too quietly for him to hear,

"You're a mutant, too?"

Erik can't help but smile at this, a quiet, closed-mouth curve of his lips, as he ducks his head in tacit agreement.

"Just like your mother said, Raven, I'm a sort of special member of the military. I'm in charge of a squad of mutant officers, mutants just like you and me, and we use our gifts to help the humans."

Of course it's not as simple as that, it's _never_ as simple as that, what with the peace between mutants and humans all too recent and only tentative at best, but of course Raven, who can't be more than a kid, if he remembers the dossier correctly, can't know about the century of conflict, of blood and torment and torture that has brought society to this point, this gossamer-thin truce of sorts— _they probably aren't teaching her about this in school—_ and there's really no need to complicate things at this point, is there?

Raven nods, and, a cheeky smile appearing on her lips, closes her eyes, and is suddenly covered in those vibrating blue feathery-scales again, growing taller and taller until Erik is once again staring into his own eyes, same as a mirror, but infinitely more bizarre and tangible than an image in a looking-glass.

"Exceptional," Erik murmurs with interest, eyes alighting on the girl's impeccable recreation of Erik's every facial line, cluster of stubble, the tiny underbite of his jaw, right down to the same eyelash length. "You're quite the shapeshifter."

 _Marvelous._

Raven-Erik bares its teeth at him quite suddenly, making Erik jump back a bit with surprise; of course, it's not every day someone turns Erik's own downright _frightening_ leer back on him, and he can only clap his hands together slowly as Raven-Erik disappears with a soft clicking noise and a whirl of blue until she is herself again, eyes bright in the glow of Erik's praise.

As Raven makes her way to sit at the kitchen table, Erik turns to face her, heart feeling a little too large for his chest.

"Would you like to see what I can do, Raven?"

The girl's shiny hair tumbles around her like a shimmering cape as she sits on one of the wooden chairs, fuzzy-socked feet resting lightly on the ground, and nods emphatically.

Erik cracks his neck a bit for effect, grounds his bare feet into the linoleum kitchen floor, and closes his eyes, allowing all of the ambient sounds of the McCoy home to fade into a gentle buzz, as his palms begin to itch something fierce. Feeling out the area for a suitable piece of metal, listening to its persistent calling to him, the way that it makes the hairs on the back of his neck stand at attention when he finds it. Like coming home. He feels his face soften, his eyes opening slowly, as he sees that useless foyer chandelier in his mind's eye, just around the corner; wiggling one index finger with a motion so _delicate_ , so _gentle_ that it is almost imperceptible, he takes a deep, deep breath and breaks off a chunk of metal from the armature of the chandelier, just a little bit off the edge, taking care to leave the thing still structurally sound.

As Raven's mouth drops open in wonder, Erik cannot help but feel a slight surge of pride as the little bit of metal floats out of the foyer and into his hands, where, with a quick bit of concentration, he molds and pulls at the gummy iron until it looks like a sunflower in every way but color, down to the irregular, nearly translucent petals and textured, velvety center, before releasing his creation to hover a few feet before him.

Raven's brow furrows dramatically, lips pouting as if she is making some kind of important decision, and then tentatively reaches out her hand to grasp at the metal flower as it floats in the air between her and Erik.

When her fingers close around the object, it is as if they have gently brushed against Erik's cheek in a way that is both disarming and frightening; Erik reflexively grits his teeth as the sensation vanishes, Raven now examining the sunflower more closely, the entire thing disturbingly affectionate and _alarming_.

"Can you do that with _everything_?" Raven asks, seemingly still in a daze, turning the metal flower over and over in her hands as if trying to memorize its form, its surfaces, its weight.

Erik shakes his head and drops into the chair by Raven's. "Just metal. But you'd be surprised, Raven—there's quite a lot of metal out there in the world, in places you wouldn't expect—"

He is interrupted, rather _rudely_ , he thinks, by two loud sets of footsteps—the echoing dull thump of Alex's combat boots and the clipped _staccato_ puttering of Angel's high heels, accompanied by increasingly caustic overlapping murmurs and whispers.

"—damn it, Alex, _I'm_ taking the car, _I'm_ the one who's had a _date_ planned for, like, a _day_ now, and you can't even _get_ a date—"

" _Shit_ , Angel—can't you get your stupid boyfriend to drive you places? I've got my _own_ shit to take care of, and besides, Mom _grounded_ you yesterday because of all the school you've been skipping—"

The two McCoys stop in their tracks, twin looks of disdain and petulance sliding onto their faces as Erik sticks his head out of the kitchen doorway, that shark-like toothy mess of a grin contorting his features into what he hopes is a suitably authoritative expression, if not a wholly intimidating once.

"Hello, children. Angel. Alex," Erik begins slowly, keeping his voice low and even, taking in Angel's veering-on gothic all-black getup, noting with a silent start the thin tattooed lines patterning her shoulders— _does Moira know Angel's done that to herself?—_ then shifting his focus to Alex's heavily shadowed face under the dark hooded sweatshirt, the baggy blue jeans, those inappropriately loud shoes, before cocking his head to the side in an exaggerated show of query.

"And _where_ exactly are we headed out on this fine Sunday afternoon?" He does his best to sound casually menacing—though for all he knows, to them it sounds as grossly patronizing as it does in his own ears; he is rewarded for his efforts with an eye roll from Angel, while Alex, clearly and erroneously sensing an opportunity, lunges for the set of keys lying on the foyer table, only to miss them entirely, hand hitting wood with a _thud_ as Erik flicks said keys just out of his reach, whizzing them through the air like a bullet into his own outstretched hand.

"It's really none of your business, Mister whoever the hell you are," Angel says dismissively, digging a perfectly manicured hand into some hidden pocket in her absurdly short skirt to pull out a cell phone, though Erik notices a not insignificant amount of humor quirking her lips in the light of her brother's misfortune; Alex, for his part, rubs the rapidly-bruising heel of his hand gingerly, biting back an epithet or two, refusing to meet anyone's eyes.

" _Actually_ , Angel, it _is_ damned well my business," Erik replies, gritting his teeth together behind the straining grin and combing a snarl out of his voice. He shoves the keys into his pants pocket and folds his arms across his chest, drawing himself up to his full height before he takes several long strides into the foyer and comes to stand directly before the front door of the McCoy house.

It's quite a clever gesture, Erik thinks to himself with no small amount of pride—both practical and symbolic enough for his purposes, the message present both in form and idea: _you are not getting anything past me. Including yourselves. As the saying goes—my way or the highway. Something like that._

After all, what's Angel doing to do—try and _fly_ out of the house? Alex, Erik must admit, worries him a bit more—only _slightly more_ , of course—because the dossier wasn't _really_ very clear on what the boy's mutation does, but still—Erik savors the moment as he leers down at the two teens, imagining the gears in their sugar-addled brains turning, vague cognition forming into clear thought, taking his silent lesson to heart, undoubtedly beginning to _understand_ , after only a few hours in this child-infested hellhole in suburbia, _who_ exactly is the boss around here—

Of course, this is the precise moment when Sean, blessed be he and his toddler wisdom, decides to scream again, the animal-like sound twisting its way out of the blue bedroom, rippling down the staircase, and stabbing its arrow-straight path directly into Erik's forehead, sending each neural connection in his brain into a crackling relay of fight-or-flight response.

 _Diese Gottverdammten Kinder—_

Erik manages to spit out what he hopes is an appropriately bone-chilling _"stay here!"_ in the direction of the two eldest McCoy children as he rushes past them, bounding up the stairs in several long, airborne strides, the cast-iron chandelier above their heads crinkling a bit, reacting to the stress waves wafting from Erik like a foul scent as he stumbles his way into Sean and Armando's bedroom, breath coming in overlapping puffs. "Sean— _Sean_ —what is it, _was ist den Loss_ , what the _hell_ is the _matter_ —"

He pauses beside Sean's bed, face covered in a fresh layer of sweat, where the boy has formed a wriggling lump under his red comforter; by any application of logic, Erik thinks bitterly, the screams should be at least _somewhat_ muffled by the fabric, but _no_ , _no_ , of _course_ they aren't, that'd be too damned _convenient_ —

A moment of respite from the unholy caterwauling as Sean's moppet face pokes out from beneath the blanket, eyes crinkled with merriment above freckled cheeks, a smile threatening to split his face in two as he kicks his feet up and down, all smothered by the quilt

"I can' get out! I'm _stuck_!"

The faint sound of shoes clacking rapidly against hardwood floors coming from downstairs, followed by what can only be the front door opening and closing as, Erik realizes with a sinking feeling, Angel and Alex give him the slip, threatens to send him, at long last, into a good and proper Erik Lehnsehrr-patented rage spiral.

Jaw clenching, that ferocious underbite emerging, sharp bottom teeth grazing his upper lip, every tendon in his neck stiffening, eyes watering with suppressed effort as something like instinct deigns to kick in; Erik sinks to the floor, curling in on himself, shoulders arched forward sharply like marble wings, hands and elbow joints gone rigid, intractable as he tries, tries, _tries_ to keep that slippery lid on a cauldron of pure _fury,_ steam leaking out first in whispers, then in thick clouds from where it's been contained for far too long _._

 _Breathe. Breathe—breathe—_

As Sean innocently ducks his head back under the covers, content to thrash around and continue his ever-louder ululations, Armando takes the opportunity to begin fussing around in his crib.

Erik's eyes snap back into focus as a light tapping on his knee registers in his mind. Reflexively he lifts his head, trying to arrange his features into something a little less _psychotic_ when he sees that it's Raven, Raven who had managed to avoid this whole episode by sitting in the kitchen, playing with a metal sunflower, a moment that had seemed to be something like a truce, a respite, a moment that seems like it had been days, weeks, _months_ ago, rather than merely several minutes—

"Um… Mr. Len-shurr?" Raven tries meekly, biting her lower lip and looking directly into Erik's eyes in a way that unsettles him immensely.

He blinks a few times, tries to convince his body to relax. "Yes, Raven?" _Yes, small child, what is it—what can your fucking useless babysitter do for you now?_

"Can I have something to eat?"

 **Location: Oak Park, Illinois. April 14, 1426 Hours**

Something that had been needling at him clicks in Erik's mind as he watches Raven scoop another spoonful of cookie dough ice cream into her mouth.

"Raven," he begins, adjusting his crossed legs in the kitchen chair. "Why did you call Armando 'Darwin' earlier?"

Around a mouthful of dessert, Raven replies promptly, apparently eager to share her knowledge. "Well, Darwin's powers make him, you know, change into different stuff so he can't get hurt, right? Like, this one time, when Darwin came to live with us, Alex was supposed to be watching him, and Darwin ate a _LEGO_ , and Mom and Dad were _really_ freaking out that it would get stuck in his throat? But then his throat, like, got _bigger_ , or something, so he could still breathe? It was so _weird_ -looking."

Erik cuts his gaze over to Armando, sitting in his high chair, mouth covered in creamy-looking formula that had missed its mark, looking as content as can be.

Raven continues, scraping her spoon along the inside of the bowl to capture any remaining morsels, "well, I was taking this science class, at school? And the teacher said that Charles Darwin was the inventor of the theory of evolution, like, you know, how animals and plants and things change to survive in the wild? So I asked Dad if Darwin's powers worked like that, and he said that that I was right, that I could call him that if I wanted to."

Erik looks back at her, pressing his lips together, trying to ignore that potent, sickly ball of guilt bobbing in his throat.

 _Of course McCoy was too kind of a father to tell her that that's not_ really _how Darwin's theory of evolution works—_

Raven looks down at the table abruptly, as if suddenly trying to memorize the grain of the wood, her entire body gone rigid as a single tear slides its way down her cheek, accompanied by the expected but no less affecting wobbling lower lip. A sniffle clotted with phlegm shakes her shoulders almost violently; her lips have gone white with effort, cheeks mottling with emotion as another tear follows in the same path as the first one.

 _Oh, Scheiße—please don't start crying again—_

"Fascinating," he manages thinly, awkwardly as Sean, seated beside Raven at the table, lifts his bowl of ice cream in front of his face and begins to lick at it, little red tongue lapping at the soupy sweet mess like a dog drinking water from a dish.

Erik sighs, already sensing a losing battle brewing. "Sean—don't do that. That's not good manners…" he stops himself, fighting the urge to bang his head on the kitchen table as Sean flips the bowl over and places it on top of his head like a porcelain hat; Raven swipes at her cheeks roughly and turns to look at her brother, rolling her eyes like a miniature adult as several streams of what used to be mint-chocolate-chip ice cream trail down the sides of his face, tangling in his hair and dripping onto his _Incredible Hulk_ pajama top.

"Ew, Sean, that's _gross_ ," she says reproachfully. Sean responds with a giggle, swiping his finger along his cheeks and neck to catch the drops of pale green, placing them into his mouth without a care in the world.

Raven shakes her head disapprovingly, turning her head to look back at Erik. " _Children_ ," she proclaims dramatically, a huff curling around her words, as if she is a grown woman who has managed to give birth to and care for several of her own offspring, rather than barely an adolescent herself—

"And you're _not_ a child?" Erik shoots back, a brittle laugh rattling his chest.

Raven throws her spoon back in her bowl, sitting up straight in her chair and looking up at Erik imperiously. "I'm almost twelve years old. I'm not a _baby_ like Darwin or a _toddler_ like Sean, you know."

"Ah, yes, I'm sorry, Raven. You're practically an adult already," Erik quips, leaning back in his seat and crossing his arms in front of his chest. "Pretty soon you'll be going off to university and getting a job, no doubt. Tell me, Raven McCoy, what's your tax rate?"

"Huh?"

"Never mind." Erik feels his lips quirk into what feels like a genuine smile as Raven shrugs to herself, hops up from her seat, and pads over to the freezer; she hooks her fingers into the handle and begins to pull it open, only to yelp in outrage as Erik narrows his eyes shrewdly, holding the magnetized metal door closed with his power.

"And _what_ do you think you're doing with that freezer door, Raven?"

Raven tugs uselessly at the door handle a few more times before looking back over at Erik, eyes gone wide and round, cheeks pinking cherubically. "Getting more ice cream?" she asks sheepishly, as if she knows the jig is up, but has nonetheless decided to forge on forward.

 _Their proper diet begins tomorrow_ , Erik promises himself, another chuckle hissing from between his lips. "Ah, yes. Nice try, Raven. Go take your bowl to the sink and rinse it out."

Raven tilts her head to the side, blond waves slipping around her shoulders, as she tries and fails to look suitably angelic. "But I was so _good_ today…"

Erik throws back his head sharply and laughs heartily at that, a rough, barking noise that causes Raven's mask of blamelessness to slip into a more age-appropriate expression of pre-teen annoyance; Sean pauses whatever he's doing to look at Erik, seemingly aghast at the downright _bestial_ sound tearing itself from his throat; even Armando stops his absent-minded baby-babble, the sound of Erik's mirth shocking even him into silence.

 _Good_ Gott _—if this is good behavior from these children, I'd hate to see what_ bad _behavior looks like—_

 **Location: Oak Park, Illinois. April 14, 2218 Hours**

Erik immediately regrets his half-sarcastic wish the second his eyes snap open, entire body rippling to waking readiness as someone's unrestrained guffaw, bright and joyful, cuts through the light sleep Erik had eventually claimed after several hours of lying awake in the too-soft bed in the McCoy's guest bedroom, staring at the ceiling and manipulating the coins in his khaki pants pocket lying in the corner of the small room.

Unease sparks itself like pure adrenaline through his veins, tingling every inch of his skin into alertness. Dread.

 _It can't be a break-in. No. I would have heard_ that _—_

Repeating the mantra does little, if anything, to reassure himself.

Like a flitting shadow detaching itself from its host, Erik leaps up from the bed silently, pressing his back against the wall of the small bedroom as he silently calls the small-caliber handgun from the bottom of his suitcase to him, a few bullets trailing in its wake; grasping the weapon tightly, body, Erik opens the door to the room, squinting reflexively at the yellow light from the ceiling fixture, keeping his breathing low and through his nose as he makes his way towards the source of the commotion.

— _Can't wake the sleeping children, after all—and it's not like getting them to bed was easy in the least, mein Gott—_

—There were things Erik would do for a job; along with that, Erik had previously supposed, there had to come things he _couldn't_ bring himself to do, though he'd not yet had to test those limits—until Raven had demanded to be read a story before bed, something about _elves_ and _wizards_ and _pumpkins_ , and Sean had demanded Erik sing several songs from some _abominable_ soundtrack, led by some creepy man with nothing better to do than write _hideous_ lyrics about _sharing_ and _cakes_ and _baby fucking Beluga_ —

Slowly. Foot over foot on lightly creaking wood, what had sounded like one voice giving way to several, all beginning to talk over themselves with increasing looseness, excitement; Erik picks out a drawling female voice as he gets closer to the McCoy's sitting room, along with what can only be the sluice of liquid being gulped down a greedy throat; a few murmurs, tones he doesn't recognize; Erik quietly slides the bullets into the chamber of the gun, preparing for the worst, and then he startles himself with the force of his growl as he stamps across the threshold of the room, stealth given over to intimidation, both hands wrapped around the pistol as he points it at the first target he sees:

 _"Freeze!"_

"Jesus _fucking_ Christ!" Angel yelps, seeming to jump a good six inches above her normal height, a handle of something brownish slipping from between her fingers, what smells like scotch spilling out across the mottled rug, as a boy Erik doesn't recognize, a boy Angel's age with gelled, shoulder-length black hair and a gray shirt whirls around to face him, the force of his movement creating a slight breezy ripple in the air, lifting his hands above his shoulders when he sees Erik's gun; a few more teens, more nondescript than the others, who had been sitting on the couch placing their hands behind their heads like they're in some cop drama, looking genuinely surprised and almost petrified, much to Erik's delight; lastly, Alex, standing in the corner of the room nursing a beer, slowly, tipsily lifts his head to make blurry eye contact with Erik.

"Oh, i's jus' _this_ asshole," he proclaims, all slurred and wobbly, lifting the bottle to his lips and draining it, letting it fall to the ground and shatter before following the others' lead and lifting his hands to where Erik can see them.

Erik grits his teeth in frustration as he sweeps his gaze over the six of them, keeping the gun steady as he feels around for metal in their pockets, anything potentially dangerous, just in case—

"What the _fuck_ , dude?" Angel continues, an outraged shriek rising in her voice, and when Erik turns his steely glare back on her, he sees that not only is she several inches in the air still, but that she's _floating—_ a soft _whir_ of shiny insect-like wings keeping her aloft. It's almost beautiful, he thinks strangely to himself, and perhaps on any other occasion he would want to observe this mutation further, but as it is—

"None of you are _legal_ , I'm assuming," Erik snaps coldly, slowly lowering the gun and gesturing towards the now-empty handle lying uselessly on the floor.

The six teens follow his gesture with their eyes and then look back up at him, all but Alex and Angel starting to tremble with the embarrassment of the discovered, each of them refusing to actually make eye contact with anyone else in the room.

Erik inhales slowly, raggedly, willing his voice to sound a bit less murder-y, a bit _less_ like he's ordering a hit on someone when he next speaks: "anyone without the last name 'McCoy,' get _out_. _Now._ "

The dark-haired boy in the gray shirt exchanges a wary glance with Angel, who somehow manages to look both put-upon and downright _vicious_ , and with another strange gust of wind, he and the other two teen girls have gently drifted out of the sitting room, the front door blowing open, the tiny swirl of air disappearing as the door floats back closed.

 _Ah. Interesting mutation,_ Erik catches himself thinking as he empties the bullets from the gun, moving both to his sweatpants pockets as Angel drops back down to stand on the floor, perfectly balanced on her high-heeled boots, hands jammed onto her hips with impressive attitude as she opens her mouth to castigate him again; Erik cuts her off with an icy whisper, voice low and unforgiving: _"it is past ten on a Sunday night, you brats—_ unless I'm mistaken, I believe you all have _school_ tomorrow—and what the _hell_ are you doing, bringing _strangers_ into the house when I've been _goddamned_ assigned to make sure nothing _goddamn_ happens to you lot—"

 _As much as I'd like to lock you all up myself to make this job that much easier, believe me—_

"—not to _mention_ that in _this_ country, you don't get to _fucking_ drink until you're twenty-one, and I'm _sure as hell_ not putting up with your _bullshit_ on my watch. When I'm gone, feel _fucking_ _free_ to muck about, but until your mother returns, _you are going to follow my orders_. Do you _copy_?"

Neither Angel nor Alex looks particularly impressed—or intimidated, for that matter—by Erik's display; Alex merely lifts his sweatshirt hoodie over his head and sticks his hands in his pants pockets, gurgling a little drunken laugh, voice flat with mockery. "Yeah. Uh huh. We fuckin' _copy."_

Angel, for her part, shakes her head knowingly in some kind of _adults just don't understand, what a damned square_ type of thing, Erik supposes, and click-clacks her way out of the sitting room, followed by Alex; as the two hellions sidle their way upstairs, Erik follows them, watching them melt like smoke into the thick, impenetrable darkness, and hisses up at them:

"And you're cleaning up this _verdammte_ mess tomorrow, _got that_?"


End file.
